Ilkeston Community Chapel

24/06/2026

We’ve been quiet at Chapel HQ lately, but that doesn’t mean nothing is happening behind the scenes.

Our CIC is run entirely by volunteers. We’re a small team of professionals with busy lives, working long hours and with other commitments, so progress can be slower than we’d like. However, we continue to move the project forward whenever time allows, and we remain committed to seeing this beautiful historic building restored for community use.

This week we were delighted to receive our official Certificate of Incorporation for Ilkeston Community Chapel CIC - a small but significant milestone on our journey. 💒

Many of you will already know the lovely Rev’d Christine French, who serves as our Treasurer (and more besides!). To celebrate our progress so far, Christine kindly had our certificate framed and sent it to me.

Christine isn’t keen on having her photo taken, so you’ll have to make do with me posing proudly with it instead! 😊

Thank you to everyone who continues to follow, support and encourage the project. Your interest means a great deal and helps keep the momentum going.

ParkCemeteryChapel 💒✨

22/05/2026

Saturday 23/5 is the next clean-up day at Park Cemetery Chapel! ☀️

Get out in the sunshine and join the team for a few hours helping to care for this special place. New volunteers and group members are always very welcome.

Just come along to the chapel for 9:30am, grab a broom, barrow or litter picker, and get stuck in - it’s quite therapeutic!

We’d love to see you there! 💒

25/04/2026

New Friends of Park Cemetery meet up every few weeks to clean and clear the cemetery grounds. Volunteers always welcome!

25/04/2026

The New Friends of Park Cemetery out in force today (here are just some of them). Fantastic work clearing the guttering and tidying the grounds. The group always welcomes new members - please join their page if you’d like to get involved.

Scroll for some great before & after images!

https://www.facebook.com/share/g/17ua2ay2Wn/?mibextid=wwXIfr

21/04/2026

𝙒𝙝𝙤 𝙣𝙚𝙚𝙙𝙨 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙜𝙮𝙢 𝙬𝙝𝙚𝙣 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙧𝙚’𝙨 𝙤𝙪𝙧 𝙜𝙧𝙚𝙚𝙣 𝙜𝙮𝙢? 💪🌿

𝗦𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝟮𝟱𝘁𝗵 𝗔𝗽𝗿𝗶𝗹 is the next 𝗡𝗲𝘄 𝗙𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗱𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝗣𝗮𝗿𝗸 𝗖𝗲𝗺𝗲𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘆 working party.

All welcome. We could do with a few more regular members to help out - even an hour makes a big difference.

Meet us in the chapel at 9:30am (yes - you get to see inside!) before getting to work until around 1pm.

Please join the group page - https://www.facebook.com/groups/375941068127920 and come along, sleeves rolled up and boots on!
🌱🪏🌼🧤🌤️

20/04/2026

Well… we shared our page across all the local ‘Spotted’ groups
- reaching thousands of people -
and gained a grand total of…
4 followers 😄

So now we’re asking 𝘺𝘰𝘶 - our community in Ilkeston and beyond;
if you’d love to see Park Cemetery chapel restored and reopened, we’d really appreciate your help:

Please could you:
• Share our page to your own profile or business pages
• Invite others to follow
• Join the New Friends of Park Cemetery group ahead of Saturday’s working party

Every share helps us grow our reach and strengthens our funding applications.

Thank you for being part of this
Ilkeston Community Chapel CIC 💛

facebook.com/ilkestoncommunitychapel/

A community-led project to restore and reopen Ilkeston’s historic Park Cemetery chapel

10/04/2026

Park Cemetery was established in 1892. The chapel was built in 1910 at the heart of the cemetery, serving generations of local families for nearly 100 years.

Can you remember Park Cemetery when it had a working chapel?

Here are some lovely images of bygone days…
📷 The view from the chapel towards the bottom of Cantelupe Road
📷 A traction engine passing by

If you have memories or photographs of the chapel in use, we’d love you to post them here. (If you’re happy for us to share them, please add ‘permission to share’ in your comment).💛

02/04/2026

I relocated to Ilkeston in 2011 and since then I’ve been drawn to Park Cemetery chapel - envisioning it reopened for public use.

Over the years, I’ve photographed it through the seasons and this memory from 5 years ago came up on my feed.

How about you?
Do you have photos or memories of our beautiful chapel?

We’d especially love to see any bygone images to help support our campaign. (If you’re happy for us to share them, please add ‘Permission to share’ in your comment, thank you).

Wishing the people of Ilkeston a peaceful Easter 💛🥚🐣